Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson In Talks To Join GI Joe: Cobra Strikes

After the worldwide box office success of The Fast And Furious 5, it should not come as a surprise to many that Dwayne Johnson has once again become a hot commodity in Hollywood circles. According to Deadline Hollywood, he is currently in talks with Paramount Pictures to star as Roadblock in the sequel to 2009's GI Joe: The Rise Of Cobra which has just been officially titled as GI Joe: Cobra Strikes. The character Roadblock is a heavy machine gunner who also doubles as a chef which in some weird way seems to fit perfectly with the variety of all out action to kiddie comedy roles that Dwayne Johnson has played in his career.

Roadblock

If you had the misfortune of watching the first GI Joe film you will agree with me that the film left much to be desired. The acting, especially lead actor Channing Tatum, was cringe-inducing,  the CGI was horrible, there were way too many characters that didn't add much to the story and the plot was downright silly. Unfortunately for us the film just about made enough money ($302 million from a $175 million budget) to make Paramount confident enough to take a shot at a sequel. As things stand the sequel seems to be more of a reboot with a new director coming in, Jon Chu (Justin Bieber: Never Say Never), and a whole host of actors from the previous film not reprising their roles. Add to that the fact that the current trilogy of Transformers films is concluding this July, that the Marvel films are now owned by Disney and that Star Trek 2 in all likelihood won't make it's announced June 29, 2012 release date and it becomes clear that GI Joe 2 will probably be Paramount's only US summer blockbuster for 2012 and it therefore has become THAT much more important to the studio's fortunes.

Hopefully this new level of importance will lead to us getting a much better film and adding The Rock to the cast will certainly up it's must see factor by a few notches.

Will adding Dwayne Johnson to GI Joe 2 convince you to watch the film?

GI Joe: Cobra Strikes will be released in August 2012.